Memory efficient Ubuntu VMs

Great tips! Thanks! :)

Wouldnt removing modules affect performance because some modules might be loaded for performance or memory purposes. Can there be adverse effects as well of doing this. If lightweight is only need, why not use the lightweight distributions like Tinycore linux.

How much ram do you win, blacklisting those modules ?

All the kernel modules of my desktop sum a few KB. Only in 1 system I see "nvidia" is a big module, but it doesn't use to be loaded in virtual machines.

About the blacklisting method... I use to never touch the distribution files inside /etc/modprobe.d (to ease upgrades, differences across hosts, etc).

I think it could be better to use something like /etc/modprobe.d/local.conf or hostname.conf

And note, that the "blacklist" directive, by side effects, may avoid module autoloading at boot time, but the real way to disable a module (forever) is to use this instead of "blacklist":

    install modname /bin/true

For more information, see blacklist in: man 5 modprobe.d

I did expect to see more tips about "userspace" configurations, where it's more easy to win MB instead of KB.

At kernel level... after change the kernel for one more light, and tune which modules are loaded... if we go for details... still you could see which params are available for loaded modules (some params may affect ram usage) and which sysctl values we can tune in the kernel (buffers, limits, etc) to affect ram usage.

Great idea! I personally haven't had any experience with the cloud images so far but now that I looked at them I really like your idea. +1

I use Ubuntu for convenience and because that's the distro that I am the most familiar with. I know that Ubuntu is a Debian derivative but I tend to use Ubuntu because of the wide range of community resources.